Sony CP-F1L External Battery Review

Let’s be honest about one thing – battery life on an Android phone is not that great. Sure we’ve now got devices like Galaxy Note II that pack a humongous capacity of battery that would easily last a day but most of the devices are still not built for a full day operation. Add to the fact that when you’re on the field all day covering shiny gadgets at CES, it becomes a difficult task to find an AC charging slot to replenish the phone’s battery with the juice. Luckily, Sony loaned me one of their latest USB external battery to try it out and here’s what I think if it’s a worthy purchase for you or not.

Sony currently has two external battery accessories – one is the CP-F1L with a 3500mAh battery and another is CP-F2L with 7000mAh battery capacity. I recieved the smaller 3500mAh one.

To start with, the bundled contents of the battery include the main unit, a microUSB cable, AC adapter and a manual.

Admittedly, design is one of the last things to consider for an external battery but the design here needs a special mention. It resembles a portable HDD and has a brushed aluminium finish that looks really attractive. There’s just a single button on the whole accessory to initiate or cut off the battery supply of the charger to the deice. Apart from that, you’ll find two USB ports – a normal sized USB to insert a cable for charging the device and a microUSB port to charge the external battery.

Using the Sony external battery is really simple. Just plug the included microUSB cable (or bundled with your phone), connect the phone and push the button on the external battery. To charge a completely dead device (I used Galaxy S II) to 100%, the external battery took about 2.5 hours. Since, Galaxy S II is packed with a 1650mAh battery, Sony’s external charger was good enough to charge the phone one more time. I also found that it takes roughly over 4 hours to charge the external battery through the included AC adapter.

One thing that makes Sony’s offering unique is the fact that it can charge the phone as well as get charged through an AC adapter at the same time.

So would I recommend it? Yes but only if you’re considering to charge your smartphone or a digital camera. If you’re the one who also wants to charge the tablet on the go, Sony’s 7000mAh CP-F2L is the way to go since it has a higher charging output and comes with two USB ports to charge two gadgets simultaneously.

The street price of CP-F1L is around Rs. 2,500 whereas CP-F2L goes for around Rs. 4,500.

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